Specter's last stand

The octogenarian with the patchy hair entered the converted conference room pumping his fists to chants of "Arlen! Arlen!"

Arlen Specter, then 80, wielded them as a symbol of his personal stamina after bouts with lymphoma, brain tumors and double bypass surgery, and of his ferocious final push to retain the U.S. Senate seat he had held for three decades.

"I've been in a lot of tough races," he said. "And I've won 'em."

The May 2010 primary-eve rally in Pittston Township was the moderate Republican-turned Democrat's last public appearance in Luzerne County. Specter lost the next day to former Rep. Joe Sestak, a retired three-star admiral from the Philadelphia suburbs by 81,346 votes, or 7.7 percent of the vote. Sestak lost to Republican Pat Toomey in the general election.

Specter, who represented Pennsylvania in the U.S. Senate from 1981 to 2011 after gaining notoriety for establishing the "magic bullet theory" in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, died Sunday from complications of a third occurrence of lymphoma. Specter's family confirmed the death in a statement to the media.

Specter, 82, was diagnosed in July with a "serious form of cancer" - his third bout with lymphoma - and underwent treatment at a Philadelphia hospital. Specter had overcome the cancer twice before: an advanced form of Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2005 and a less-advanced form of Hodgkin's disease in 2008. Specter appeared to overcome those earlier bouts, working through chemotherapy and joking about his temporary baldness.

Specter remained feisty and energetic to the end of his political career, campaigning in seven cities the day before his primary loss, barnstorming across the state from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia with a blistering response to a Sestak television ad that portrayed him as an opportunist who left the Republican Party for the Democratic Party to bolster his re-election chances.

"Now, who's the real, good Democrat in the race?" Specter asked the crowd at the Pittston Township event.

Specter reminded voters of his record in the region: the $18.2 million he secured in 2008 and 2009 for the Tobyhanna Army Depot, the $1.2 million he secured in 2009 to increase flood controls on the "raging" Susquehanna River, and $3 million in seed money for a potential passenger rail line to New York City.

Specter's party move came after he joined two other Republicans to vote in favor of the stimulus bill in the Senate - a decision that eviscerated his support among state Republicans and precipitated his party switch.

"I refused to go along with the obstructionist Republican caucus and I joined the president in casting that vote knowing that it was politically perilous," Specter said after the rally. "I decided it was more important to save America from a depression than it was to save my job."

A year-and-a-half earlier, while he was still a Republican, some doubted whether Specter would run for a sixth term, given his battles with cancer.

"I had a little medical problem; I'm past that," he said. "I've had chemotherapy, as I've characterized it, tough but tolerable. I was able, during even in the midst of all of the treatments, to stay on the job, make all the votes, go to all the committee hearings. You saw me conduct the confirmation of (Chief Justice John) Roberts bald. Now that I've got my hair back, what the hell, I'm in the pink. Yeah, I'm running."

msisak@citizensvoice.com

570-821-2061, @cvmikesisak

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